The Umbrella Stand Strikes Again
by xCyaniide
Summary: Tonks trips over the umbrella stand in Order HQ as per usual! and she has to go to hospital. Remus is there for her during this time.
1. Chapter 1

Tonks had just finished a long day at the Ministry and was feeling rather tired. She had stayed at Grimmauld Place the previous evening and had left the majority of her things there as she had an early start and hadn't wanted to wake everyone else. She had returned during one of her breaks in order to grab her lunch, then again during her lunch break to grab her coat as it was pouring with rain but she needed to return their once more that evening in order to collect all of the rest of her belongings that she had taken there for the evening she stayed. She knew it would make more sense to just leave some things there but then she never could be sure what the rest of the Order got up to in that place and didn't want to risk leaving things there in case they were tampered with. Particularly by the Weasley twins.

She was making her way into Number 12, Order HQ, for the third time that day. She seemed to be spending more and more time going past the umbrella stand in the hallway and she thought she may finally have been getting the hang of walking successfully past it without causing any harm to either herself, anyone else or the umbrella stand and its contents.

As she closed the door behind her and turned around, she eyed the stand cautiously. Someone had moved it slightly. She sighed slightly, guessing she wasn't likely to trip over it just because it had moved and began to walk down the corridor past it.

Unfortunately for both herself and for the umbrella stand, she had been wrong. She caught her foot on the stand and fell flat on her face with the umbrella stand clattering to the ground with a couple of umbrellas landing on top of her.

"For Merlin's sake," she muttered, pulling herself up off of the ground and looking at the mess on the floor. Then, she noticed the blood. Her blood. She sighed, looking down herself, then at both of her hands as if trying to work out where the blood was coming from.

Then, the room began to spin and she felt herself falling, falling, falling...


	2. Chapter 2

The next thing Tonks saw was the bright lights of a ward in St Mungo's and the face of a rather concerned-looking Remus Lupin looking over her. She could feel a throbbing pain in her head and she tried to sit up but failed, groaning a little and closing her eyes.

"Tonks, are you okay?" Remus asked as he continued to look at her with concern in his eyes.

She felt his hand move on top of hers and smiled a little, re-opening her eyes to see his face once more, "Yes, yes, I just tripped over that blasted umbrella stand again," she replied with a small laugh. She moved her hand beneath his in order to hold it rather than just having it resting on hers. "I'll be okay," she added, squeezing his hand a little.

Remus looked at their hands which were now gripping one another and he smiled a little, although cautiously because he knew how she felt about him, "If you're sure," he replied. "Do you need anything?" he asked her, knowing she might well need a drink or something to eat.

Tonks smiled but shook her head a little, then groaned again because it hurt, "Nothing unless I can have pain killer of some sort," she replied, frowning. "Although the Healers are likely to have done that already, right?" she asked.

Remus nodded and smiled, gently squeezing her hand and thinking it was quite nice to be holding hands with someone. It had been years since he had done that, "You should probably try to keep still though in order to minimise the pain," he smiled.

"I don't like it in hospitals though," she said, frowning, "If I wasn't somewhere like this where the lights are always so bright, things might be easier than they are being here." She often ended up in hospital because she was so clumsy and she really hated being kept in for more than a few hours. "Do you think I'll be able to leave today?" she asked him, sounding hopeful that she might.

"No, I doubt it," Remus replied after a short pause, guessing that she didn't realise just how bad the injuries on her head actually were. "I should think they'll want to keep you here for a few days at least. And then they'll only let you leave if you have care from someone."

Tonks sighed, forcing her body to sit up, "I'm fine, for Merlin's sake. Why can't they just let me go home or go someplace else at least?" she sighed once more, looking around the room at the other patients and their visitors. "When do we get fed in this place?" she asked, laughing at the look on Remus' face at the randomness of her question.

"They won't let you go home because you're in no fit state to do so," he tried to put it as carefully as he could so as not to make her feel as though she was too badly hurt. "They need to keep an eye on you to make sure you don't deteriorate." He then looked at her slightly oddly when she mentioned food and replied, "I have no idea when they'll feed you. I could get you something from the canteen downstairs though if you want," he offered.

Tonks shook her head immediately, then regretted doing so because the room began to spin. She shut her eyes tightly, gripping Remus' hand more tightly once again and trying not to faint. "You can't afford to do that, Rem," she said, her face going rather paler than it had been before.

"Oh, it hardly matters. Your health is more important," he said forcefully, frowning as she got paler and gripped his hand more tightly, "What's wrong?" he asked with a concerned tone to his voice.

She tried to answer but found herself unable to do so. She felt the room spinning around her and then her head hit the pillow on her bed, her grip slackened on Remus' hand and she simply lay there unconscious once again...


	3. Chapter 3

When Tonks awoke once again, she found herself in a room by herself this time. She frowned a little, wondering why the lights were now a luminous orange in colour rather than the bright yellow of the ward she had been on last time she opened her eyes. She moved her head a little, trying to identify the room she was in, but found her head spinning more violently than it had done before and she groaned, closing her eyes tightly and deciding to listen instead of look.

"Miss Tonks, are you awake?" a voice asked her and she made her eyes open once more to find a Healer standing above her. "A nasty fall, you had there. I'm not quite sure what happened on the last ward but it's a good thing your friend was there to look after you."

"How did I get here?" she asked, trying to sit up a little, only to find the hand of the Healer pushing her back to the bed once again.

"We can discuss that in a little while but for now, you must rest and not try to get up. You're ill and you need to rest or your head will be spinning like that for weeks," the healer answered and Tonks slowly closed her eyes again.

She heard the Healer walking away and she felt her mind beginning to slip into nothingness once again, almost as if she was passing out. She couldn't have been, though, because he found herself dreaming instead.

_A man was standing in the doorway to her flat. A rather tall, lean man with very little fat on him at all. The way he stood made him look old, yet she got the feeling that he wasn't as old as he appeared to be. He was simply a much worn man who had been through a lot in his lifetime. _

_She saw herself opening the door to let him in and she smiled at how the two people looked at one another. There was love in the eyes of them both. Of her and Remus. _

_They headed down a corridor in her flat which she knew lead into the kitchen and she already knew what would be coming next without even having to see the rest of the dream._

"_Would you like a hot chocolate, Rem?" her own voice asked as the two of them made their way into the kitchen and she offered Remus a seat. Just as she had thought; chocolate._

"_Yes please, Dora. That would be wonderful," Remus replied, his voice melting her inside like it so often did whenever he spoke to her._

_The smell of chocolate began to fill her nose and a smile spread across her lips as she knew chocolate would make Remus happy. He seemed to be happy enough anyway without even needing to have any chocolate for once, though, which was rather a surprise to Tonks. _

"_Thanks Dora," his voice spoke again in her ear and she smiled as he took the drink and drank it. It was such a simple thing but she loved seeing this in her dreams. She adored it. She adored him. _

_The smell and taste of chocolate continued to flood her senses and she could hear her name being called somewhere distantly. _

"Dora, are you awake?" Remus was standing over her bed with a hot chocolate in his hands when she opened her eyes. She smiled a little, ignoring the healer's advice to lie down and not move as she pulled herself into a sitting position.

"I am now," she replied, smiling at him as her mind swam a little and three of him appeared all in a line in front of her. She frowned and closed her eyes for a few seconds, coming to her senses more, and then opened them again. "I should have known you'd find some excuse to have chocolate," she said, smiling at him once again.

"I take it you feel a little better now, then," he laughed and put his drink down on the table beside her bed. Only then did she notice that she was back on a ward and she looked around it carefully before her eyes returned to him. "The healer told me you woke up a few days ago but soon fell back into a deep sleep," he said, sitting down in the chair beside her bed.

"A few days ago?" Tonks asked, frowning, "I thought that was earlier today, merely an hour or so ago," she laughed a little, then regretted it as her head span again.

"She also said you seemed to have lost your memory a little. You were unconscious for about a month, Dora," he said and she noticed then that he looked more tired than last time she had seen him. He looked older, thinner and more grey-haired than ever before, in fact.

"Wow," she said, looking a little dazed by the idea that she had missed so much time without realising it. "You look tired," she commented, a slight frown spreading across her lips.

Remus chuckled, "Well I have been here with you pretty much all the time for the past month, minus a day or two of course. You can't expect me to be jumping around the place!"

"Why?" Tonks asked, causing Remus to give her a rather confused look.

"Why what?" he asked, unsure of what he had just said that needed clarifying.

"Why have you been here so much?" She asked, feeling rather flattered that he had but also wishing he hadn't at the same time as she knew how much it must have cost him in bus fares to get there daily.

"Because I care," he replied, his lips forming a smile as she realised she was staring at him and looked away. "It's the least I could do, anyway. I didn't want you waking up to find yourself alone in a cold hospital ward full of ill people and healers," he smiled at her once more, knowing how she hated hospitals.

"Thanks, Remus," she said, smiling back at him and then glancing at his hot chocolate, "Your drink will be getting cold, you know," she said.

"It doesn't matter," he replied, his full attention on her rather than the chocolate for once. "I can replace the hot chocolate," he smiled, knowing she was thinking about the wasted money and he added, "And money is replaceable too. People can never be replaced."

"I hardly care if you're drinking a hot chocolate at the same time as taling to me, you know," Tonks replied, feeling even more flattered than she already had done before when he had told her that he hadn't left her side.

"I know," he said, "But I have plenty of time to drink hot chocolate without any distractions. I nearly lost you once. I'm not doing it again," he said firmly, gently taking her hand in his. "You're cold," he then stated, gently moving her duvet around her a little more tightly than it had been already to try sand keep her warm.

"Thanks Remus," she said, holding his hand tightly and never wanting to let go. She had never expected him to say such a thing and had thought that it was the sort of thing that only happened in her dreams. "I am awake, right?" she asked, laughing a little nervously.

Remus nodded and laughed, "Yes Dora, you're awake. You should be asleep resting, though," he urged her, smiling a little at the slight look of annoyance she gave him when he said that. "You need to get better. And to do that, you need to sleep."

"So do you," Tonks protested, not wanting to sleep as dreams could never be as good as having the real thing right there with her.

Remus didn't answer to that, though. He just kissed her gently on the forehead, grabbed his hot chocolate and sat there watching her as he drank it and waited for her to sleep. Soon enough, sleep came over her and she felt her eyelids shutting out the vision of him and his hot chocolate there in front of her.


End file.
